vice president joe biden was out. he reiterated those two nonnegotiable demands on the part of the administration but said the actual amount of that top rate doesn't necessarily have to be 39.6. >> there are two irreducible minimum requirements. one, the top brackets have to go up. this is not a niabl issue. the second thing is, we have to have a mechanism to stop the brinksmanship on dealing with the national debt. >> now of course, this doesn't necessarily signal a turn in the talks between the administration and the congress. but there is the possibility that you have staff level discussions that continue to go on and we're just going to have to see over the next three weeks whether they can make a break. sometimes it looks darkest before the dawn. >> many thanks john howard. back to our panel. kerry, on this show last night, senator rand paul basically said you know what, no filibuster in the senate. let the democrats put their bill up and he will vote for it and make it a democratic tax hike period. end of senten